Monday, Sep. 08, 1941
"Dirty Falsehoods"
Every honest newspaper man in Washington last week knew the existence of a semi-organized campaign to spread lies about the British, particularly about alleged British misuse of Lend-Lease funds. For two weeks one such story made the rounds of irresponsible gossips: that the British in Washington were running up huge cafe and restaurant bills for rare wines, whiskey, food, were charging it all to Lend-Lease funds. The British were further supposed to have ordered the installation of 100 portable air-conditioning units in their hotel rooms; to have chatted for hours with Canadian friends by long-distance telephone--in all cases charging the bill to Lend-Lease.
Last week the story suddenly appeared in the Washington Times-Herald, which reprints correspondence from the Chicago Tribune. Under the byline of New Deal-hating Correspondent Walter Trohan was the story, ascribed only to "reliable Congressional circles," and headlined: "British Here Make Whoopee As U.S. Pays--$30,000 in Wine, Food Reported Charged To Lend-Lease Bill." The story had a fancy new touch: Trohan wrote that the British actually sang a song (to the tune of There'll Always Be An England) which ran: "There'll always be a dollar, as long as we are here." "Charge it to Lend-Lease", wrote Mr. Trohan, "is a byword at British headquarters."
The biggest single fact on which all these stories was based was obviously untrue: no cash changes hands in Lend-Lease transaction. The British cannot possibly charge such items, as Lend-Lease procedure is guided as much by what the U.S. needs as by what England needs, is concerned primarily with guns, tanks, planes, more & more with the direct shipment of foodstuffs.
But the fact that such a story could be printed revealed how little the average U.S. citizen understood such a complex procedure. The story was easy to understand; and some isolationists even professed a grudging admiration for British sharpness--making it seem all the truer.
A follow-up story came out in the New York Daily News. Not to be outdone, Correspondents John O'Donnell and Doris Fleeson printed a story which at week's end was still undenied by its principal--Federal Loan Administrator Jesse H. Jones. Lender Jones was reported present at a discussion of an alleged British Lend-Lease requisition for glasses of all kinds--sherry, port, brandy glasses. The order supposedly ended with a request for several drums of rum. Doubtless not bearing in mind Dunkirk, Libya, Crete and the R.A.F. every night over the Channel, Jones is supposed to have instantly suggested: "Give them the rum. Maybe they'll fight."
Enough was enough. The President at his next press conference took cognizance of the rumors. When Newshawk O'Donnell asked a question, the President snapped his head off with a brusque answer. Then Mr. Roosevelt turned to other stories about the misuse of Lend-Lease funds, labelled them as examples of the vicious rumors, distortion of facts, or just plain, dirty falsehoods, which he said were being circulated in an organized campaign to sabotage the program to defeat Hitlerism. The condemnation was one of the bitterest he had ever made--and one of the truest.
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